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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8624115" data-attributes="member: 6790260">Yeah it's definitely a tossup between that (which has some incredible design elements) and 4e (which is probably the system I am most mechanically well-versed with, other than DW I suppose).I have a whole set of custom Icons and a proto-setting for exploring. Essentially a blend of one part PoLand, one part Dragon Empire proper, and two parts post-post apocalypse, where society is finally beginning to rebuild after the Age of Ice and Darkness.In (relative) brief, the long-lost Golden Age was more or less classic 13th Age present day, but with the war between Arkhosia and Bael Turath in full swing--no phone, not Bagel Turath for God's sake! Anyway, BT kept itself safe with a huge navy because the two empires were on opposite continents, but then a freak storm destroyed a large portion of that navy and the opportunity was too good for Arkhosia to pass up. In desperation the Turathi leadership turned to a MASSIVE blood magic ritual, sacrificing millions of slaves to make a pact that would let bazillions of devils into the world. Unfortunately, it worked, and devils quickly began to overrun the whole planet, and the Turathi themselves were also attacked when some of them objected to their nonhuman/nontiefling friends and relatives being dismembered. The icons collectively cast a spell devised by the GGW and the Lich King that would protect the world from planar influence, but this also cut off almost all the light of the sun, causing the world to slowly freeze and die. The Lich King was completely consumed in the casting of the spell, but some say his dark essence was transformed rather than destroyed. Eventually, the GGW got real goddamn tired of the other Icons bickering and failing to DO anything to save the world from extinction, so he intentionally broke the spell, girded himself with the released energies, and filled the "hole" into hell with his own metaphysical form. That was a few centuries ago and society has just barely started to return to what it was. The Emperor is long dead, but his power lives on in softer, economic, persuasive power in the form of the Courtesan (though some think she aims to form a new Empire someday), in part helped by the newest Storm Captain, as his pirate thalassocracy now favors positive relations with the trade league that she rules from the shadows. Much of the world is still uncharted and there are many ruins and tombs from the days of darkness when the only livable places were those that could rely on an Icon to help them survive. Other Icons both eldritch and much more human have taken the places of the old ones, some familiar, some different.More or less the idea is to explore a "points of light" setting from the opposite direction: not "small lights about ready to drown in a sea of encroaching darkness," but rather "small lights about ready to burst into a world where the dark has grown old and complacent." With a side helping of explaining why the world is so full of un-looted tombs and forgotten fortresses and somehow both mapped and unknown at the same time.</blockquote>

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